The renewed event calendars of Imatra and South Karelia have gotten off to a good start

The calendar is also linked to the updated South Karelia event calendar, eventat.ekarjala.fi, where event announcers also enter Imatra's event information in accordance with previous practice. Events entered into the provincial calendar appear in Imatra's calendar, which shows only Imatra's events, in Imatra's own colors and visual appearance.

The event calendar has been actively used. This is how the renewed project manager who led the calendar reform estimates Mika Hautaniemi from the South Karelia Union.

- During the first two months of the calendar, it has accumulated 140 organizers and about 500 future events in the calendar. The numbers are higher than during the old calendar, he says.

Hautaniemi has traveled around presenting and guiding event organizers in eight municipalities of South Karelia. Next week, all the municipalities will be visited, when it's Ruokolahti's turn.

- The reception has been wildly positive and I am satisfied with how it has been implemented. An average of 20 beer associations are present at the meetings, says Hautaniemi.

The introduction of the calendar has been easy for the associations, but there has been a bit of learning.

- The biggest difficulty has been understanding that you have to set up an association in the calendar in addition to your own e-mail account. After that, it's easy for events to enter. On the other hand, it is a good thing that one person can report on behalf of many associations and the association can have many people reporting events. That's a big advantage, Hautaniemi sums up.

Most ticket systems, such as Ticketmaster used by Kulttuuritalo Virra, can be connected to the calendar, so events do not need to be entered in the calendar separately, but they appear there directly when they are in the ticket system.

The communications expert responsible for the part of the city of Imatra in the calendar reform Heikki Laine according to the fact that the possibility of integrating ticket systems makes the work of event organizers much easier. 

- I believe that due to its ease of use, the calendar will hit the mark in a completely new way. It will become a more comprehensive and used event channel than before, Laine predicts.

Anyone can announce their own events in the calendar.

- Now we need a bit of activity on the part of the organizers of the events so that the summer's events can be added to the calendar and people can plan their expenses. Everyone who asks is helped, so feel free to contact Imatra city communications if you have any questions about the calendar, advises Heikki Laine.

For more information:

Project Manager, Southern Karelia Association Mika Hautaniemi 040 – 683 8437
Heikki Laine, city of Imatra, communication specialist 020 - 617 2321